Means for dispensing fluids from containers



July'll, 1939.

L. CAMPBELL, JR

MEANS FDR DISPENSING FLUIDS FROM CONTAINERS Filed April 26, 1957 5 Sheets-Sheet 1 INVENTOR.

ATTORNEYS.

July 11, 1939'.

CAMPBELL. JR MEANS FOR DISPENSING FLUIDS FROM CONT Filed April 26, 1937 AINERS 5 Sheets-Sheet 2 ATTORNEYS,

July 11, 1939. 1.. CAMPBELL. JR 3,155,342

MEANS FOR DISPENSING FLUIDS FROM CONTAINERS Filed April 26, 1937 5 Sheets-Sheet s INVENTOR.

ATTORNEYS Patented July 11, 1939 UNITED STATES OFFICE MEANS FOR DISPENSING FLUIDS FROM CONTAINERS 5 Claims.

This invention relates broadly to the field of dispensing fluids from tanks or containers. As is well-known, it is a common and wide-spread practice to store under high pressure in tanks or containers fluids which are in a gaseous condition at ordinary atmospheric pressures and temperatures. Among the gases thus stored are oxygen, acetylene and carbon dioxide, as Well as more rare and expensive gases, such as argon and neon. Some of these gases, such as oxygen, are compressed into tanks or containers under pressure of approximately 2000 pounds per square inch.

In order to make use in the industrial arts of the gases stored under such high pressures, it has been customary to eiTect a material reduction in the pressure of the gases as delivered to the points where the same are used, as by passing the same through pressure-reducing mechanism. When, however, the pressure within the tanks or containers from which the gases are drawn has fallen to a point where the gases are no longer able to pass through the pressure-reducing mechanism in sufficient volume for operating purposes, the

tanks or containers are disconnected from the pressure-reducing mechanism, and the residual gases remaining in the tanks or containers are ordinarily lost to the purchasers. A familiar instance of such loss is afforded by the use of oxygen for cutting or welding purposes, wherein it is customary to reduce the working pressure of the same to say 100 to 150 pounds per square inch. \Nhen the pressure in the cylinders or containers is insufficient to supply through the standard pressure regulators a volume of oxygen sufiicient for working purposes, the cylinders are shut off, with a loss to the purchaser of the residual oxygen therein.

It is the general purpose and object of my invention to provide means whereby the residual gas in a container'may be exhausted and made available for use, together with and by means of a gas supplied under higher working pressure from another container.

My invention is illustrated and described in detail herein in connection with a system wherein oxygen for cutting or welding purposes is distributed under high pressure from batteries of oxygen cylinders, the cylinders in each battery being connected to a pressure regulator wherein the pressure is reduced to that suitable for the cutting; or Welding operations-say to 10f) to 150 pounds per square inch-and is maintained at such pressure until the pressure in the cylinders of the battery is reduced to a point where the volume of oxygen passing through the regulator is insuificient for its effective utilization.

In the embodiment of my invention illustrated and described herein, I have provided means whereby the high pressure of the gas in a sub- 5 sequently-operated battery of cylinders may be utilized for the purpose of removing the residual gas from a preceding battery of cylinders. Such means are shown in the drawings herein, wherein Fig. 1 represents a front elevation of a portion of two batteries of cylinders connected to a common line or conduit through regulators and through my mechanism for enabling the high pressure of the gas in either battery of cylinders remove the residual gas from the other battery of cylinders; Fig. 2 is a sectional View corresponding to the line 2-2 of Fig. 1; and Fig. 3 a central vertical sectional View through my aforesaid mechanism.

While the drawings actually Show only four cylinders of each battery, I will state that my mechanism has been used in installations containing twenty cylinders in each battery; but it is believed that the illustrations herein will be suflicient to indicate how batteries containing each a large number of cylinders may be connected up in the system and how my invention may be utilized in connection therewith.

Describing by reference characters the various parts illustrated in the drawings, 4 denotes the 5 main line or conduit through which the gas is supplied to the points of use. This conduit is connected through my mechanism, indicated generally at A, with pipes 2, i leading from fluid pressure regulators 3, 3 respectively, which in turn are connected by pipe sections 4, 4 connections 5, Ed, valve bodies G, 5 and valves 1, '1 with pipes 8, 8, which in turn are connected by small coiled pipes 9, 9 known to the trade as pigtails, with the two series of cylinders iii, Ell in each battery, each cylinder being provided with a valve H, i whereby it may be placed in communication with its cooperating coiled pipe Q, 53 for supplying gas therefrom to the pipes 8, 8 located centrally between the two series of cylinders comprising each battery referred to herein. For convenience of coupling these coiled pipes or pigtails to the cylinders, the receiving end of each is provided with a handle l2, IZ

The gas is delivered from each battery of cylinders through the appropriate regulator 3, 3 and pipe 2, 2 to the mechanism A, the pressure of the gas delivered from each regulator being shown by an appropriate gauge l3, Isa.

The mechanism referred to constitutes an expirator and comprises a rectangular body having passageways comprising each a vertical side passage l4, I l respectively; upper and lower passages l and [6, respectively; and a centrally located vertical passage 2!. The pipes 2 and 2 are adapted to communicate respectively with the side passages 14, M between the ends of the same. Each of the passages 14, M is adapted to be placed in communication with the passages 55 and I5 by means of valves I7, I! having stems threaded into the top of said body and by means of valves [8, 18 having stems threaded into the bottom of said body, the said valves being arranged to cooperate respectively with seats i9, w and 20, 20 provided at the top and at the bottom of the passages M, W. Threaded into the upper end of the passage 2| is an injector nozzle 22, which extends substantially entirely across the passage l5, with its delivery end located below a Venturi tube 23, the lower end of which conimunicates with the passageway Hi. It will be noted that each passageway referred to comprises a part of each of the passages i5 and i6 and the common passage 2|.

The main line or conduit l is shown as threaded into the top of the Venturi fitting, the bottom of the fitting being threaded into the top of the body A immediately above and axially in line with the injector nozzle 22, the axes of the nozzle and Venturi tube extending diametrically across the passageway I5.

With the parts constructed and arranged as described it is believed that the operation will be readily understood. Let us suppose that the main line is to be supplied with oxygen from the battery of cylinders located on the left hand side of the expirator. In such event, the cylinder valves, the valve 1 and the valve I? on the left hand side of the expirator will be opened, all other valves being closed, and the oxygen will be delivered through the regulator 3 into the passageways i i and i5, around the nozzle 22 and through the Venturi tube 23 into the main line or conduit l. When the pressure of the oxygen thus supplied falls to a point where the volume supplied to the conduit l is insufiicient, it has been the practice heretofore to close the valve 1 and to replace the used cylinders with other cylinders having the oxygen therein under the initially high pressure approximately 2000 pounds. However, instead of cutting off the cylinders thus partially exhausted, I leave the valve ll open, leave the valves H and I8 closed, and open the valve w and the valve l controlling the supply of oxygen from the right hand battery into the expirator. The oxygen flows down the passageway Hi into the passageway l6, and upwardly through the passageway 2| and through the injector 22 and the Venturi 23. By means of the injector and the Venturi, I am enabled to exhaust from the cylinders in the left hand battery a large proportion of the residual oxygen therein which otherwise could not have been utilized. This exhausting of the residual oxygen will continue as long as the pressure of the oxygen discharged through the injector nozzle is greater than the pressure in the main line or conduit. Should the pressure in the main line exceed the pressure of the gas delivered through the nozzle, then oxygen from the cylinders of the right hand battery would be delivered into those on the left-hand side until the pressure would be equalized in the cylinders of both batteries. In order to prevent any such undesirable action, as well as to prevent the possibility of delivering oxygen from one battery of cylinders into the cylinders of the other, due to a failure to close the proper valves in the expirator at the conclusion of the operations in which the gas is employed, I have provided a check valve arranged in such relation with respect to the expirator and each battery of cylinders as will prevent gas from flowing from the expirator into the cylinders in either of these batteries. These check valves are shown at 24 and 24 in the pipe sections 2 and 2 respectively. Obviously, when the pressure in the cylinders of the right-hand battery falls to such an extent as will prevent an insufficient volume of gas to be supplied to the main line or conduit, the operation will be reversed. A new battery of cylinders containing gas under high pressure will have been substituted for the exhausted cylinders of the left-hand battery, and the valves in the expirator will then be adjusted so that the gas under high pressure from the latter cylinders will operate to exhaust residual gas from the cylinders in the right-hand battery. This will be accomplished by closing the valves [1 and l8 and opening the valves l8 and H Owing to their ease of removal, the injector nozzle 22 and the Venturi tube 23 may be readily replaced by others differing in size in order to obtain best results under varying conditions of pressure in the gases supplied from the cylinders in the batteries to the main line or conduit I.

Owing to the length of the tubes 8, 8 and to their mode of connection with the cylinders, they are supported on rails 25 carried by posts 28.

It will be obvious that my invention may be used with fluids other than those for which the apparatus or system disclosed herein is especially designed. It can, for instance, be interposed between two individual tanks or containers and will operate in the manner described hereinbefore to exhaust residual fluids from either container when the pressure therein and the volume of flow of the fluids delivered therefrom shall have fallen to a predetermined point or degree.

Having thus described my invention, what I claim is:

1. An expirator comprising a body having an injector nozzle arranged to discharge into a conduit and having a pair of passageways each comprising passages leading to the space surrounding said nozzle and to the bore of said nozzle, an inlet pipe connected with each of said passageways, and valves for controlling the flow of fluid through said passageways whereby the fluid supplied to either of the same may be delivered around the injector nozzle or through the bore of said nozzle.

2. An expirator comprising a body having an injector nozzle arranged to discharge into a conduit and having a pair of passageways each comprising passages leading to the space surrounding said nozzle and to the bore of said nozzle, a Venturi tube axially aligned with said nozzle and interposed between the said nozzle and the receiving end of said conduit, an inlet pipe connected with each of said passageways, and valves for controlling the flow of fluid through said passageways whereby the fluid supplied to either of the same may be delivered around the injector nozzle or through the bore of said nozzle.

3. An expirator comprising a body having a pair of passageways comprising each a lateral passage and passages leading from the opposite ends of said lateral passages to the space around the said injector and to the bore of said injector nozzle, an inlet pipe connected to the first mentioned passage of one of said passageways, an inlet pipe connected to the first passage of the other of said passageways, and valves for controlling the flow of fluid from each of the first mentioned passages of each passageway to the other passages thereof.

4. An expirator comprising a body having passageways each having side passages, substantially parallel continuous passages with which the opposite ends of the first mentioned passages are adapted to communicate, an injector nozzle located in one of the two last mentioned passages and adapted to deliver fluid passing therethrough into a conduit, and a passage communicating with the second of the two last mentioned passages and with the interior of said injector nozzle, an inlet pipe connected to each of the first-mentioned passages intermediate of the ends thereof, and valves located at the junction of the ends of the first two passages with the next two passages whereby the fluid supplied to the two first mentioned passages may be delivered either to the space surrounding the injector nozzle or through the bore of said nozzle.

5. An expirator comprising a body having an injector nozzle therein through which fluid may be delivered intoa conduit and having passageways, an inlet pipe connected with each passageway, each of said passageways extending from its connection with its inlet pipe to the space surrounding the said nozzle and to the bore of said nozzle, and valves controlling said passageways whereby the gas supplied through either of the said pipes to the said expirator may be delivered around the injector nozzle or through the bore of said nozzle.

LORN CAMPBELL, JR. 

